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Mickey had left the White Swallow. Gallagher had not.
He’d told him, shit. What was he supposed to, handcuff them together until Gallagher got his shit together and came back to the south side?
Mickey started the car, the engine taking great pains to turn over.
Fuck that. Not. His. Job.
Mickey gripped the wheel, staring straight ahead and telling himself he needed to just fucking drive off already and get the fuck out of there when he noticed movement in the corner of his eye. Gallagher had walked out of the side door of the club. He was wearing jeans and a hoodie now, a backpack slung over his shoulder. The creepy fuck from earlier followed behind him, talking. Gallagher nodded and stopped to take a cigarette from the guy but kept walking, stopping a few feet away from him. The guy stood back, looking at him like he was waiting for something, like he didn’t want to go back in without him.
Mickey got out of the car. Gallagher looked up at him, and it was pure surprise until that ‘fuck you’ look from earlier made its reappearance. Mickey didn’t care though. Wouldn’t be the first time someone was pissed at him, and it wouldn’t be the last. Didn’t change a thing. Gallagher didn’t look at him as he approached, smoking and staring off into space like no one else was there, but Mr. Likes-Underage-Dudes-to-Grind-On-His-Lap did. He looked Mickey up and down like he was something funny. Mickey had half a mind to knock his teeth into his throat.
“You got a fucking reason to be here?” Mickey said, coming to a stop between Gallagher and Ugly Piece of Shit.
“I didn’t know I needed one,” he said, and even his voice repulsed Mickey, because it was obvious from his hoity-toity tone that he was the kind of guy who liked to think he was smarter than everyone else.
Mickey held up the badge, looked at him like the idiot he was. “Well you do.”
“What, there a law against smoking now?” he said, but he held up his hands and took three steps back. Mickey turned to Gallagher.
“Come on,” he said, and inclined his head toward the car. Gallagher looked at the car, looked at him, then went back to his cigarette.
“No thanks,” he said. The Ugly Fuck was watching them, watching Mickey like he waiting to intervene if he needed to. Mickey knew he was just waiting to play the knight in shining armor. The thought made his muscles tense the way they always did before a fight. Let him say one goddamn thing and Mickey would be having a chat with him that began and ended with a fist in every soft part of his body. Right now, he’d focus on the task at hand: Gallagher and his infuriating, stubborn ass.
“What, you gonna get a cab? Take the train? Walk?” Mickey said. “Yeah, good luck with that.”
That was the part where he should have been walking away. He should have gotten back into the car and gone the fuck home, or at least away from whatever the fuck this was. Gallagher wasn’t even looking at him.
“You wanna waste money on a cab, fine. I’m not gonna stop you,” Mickey said. He slid the stupid ass badge back into his back pocket, turned and walked back to the car, and got inside. It was still warm, the engine still running. He jerked it into gear and drove off, relishing the squeal of the tires and the way he’d stop himself from looking at Gallagher one last time before he left.
-
Mickey sat parked at the end of the block, watching the shadowed form that was Gallagher in his rearview mirror and chain-smoking. He didn’t know what his plan was. He didn’t have a plan. He just waited. Finally, Gallagher began to walk, and when he got close enough, Mickey got out of the car and leaned against the door. He ignored him again, kept walking. Mickey stomped his heel against the wheel and pushed off, toward Gallagher.
“Just get in the fucking car, ok,” Mickey said. “I’ll take you. I’m going that way anyway.”
Mickey looked around but Ugly Fuck was nowhere to be seen. It pissed him off, the way he’d acted like Mickey was dangerous, as if were the stranger. It didn’t help, the way Mickey felt dangerous, like a predator or some shit, hiding out in a goddamn car and waiting to catch Gallagher alone. Fucking stupid. Fucking ridiculous. Fuck that guy though, he didn’t know shit. Not about him and not about this. Not about anything.
“Why the fuck do you care?” Gallagher said, shoulders hunched against the cold.
“What’s your fucking problem?” Mickey said. “I’m trying to help.”
Gallagher looked at him, snorted, and began to walk away. Mickey moved to block him with his body.
“Look, I’m not here to do this shit-” Mickey said.
“Then why are you here, Mickey?” Gallagher cut him off, face dark and half shrouded in shadow.
“Because someone needs to tell you to get your head outta your ass and go the fuck back home and I guess I’m the one to do it,” Mickey said, knowing that maybe he’d said the wrong thing but not really caring. “You’re mad at me, fine. But I told Mandy I’d bring you back so that’s what I’m gonna do.” The lie slipped easily from his lips.
“You’re such a thoughtful brother. Mandy’s lucky to have you,” Gallagher said. He made it sound like an insult, and pushed past Mickey.
“Gallagher,” Mickey said. He didn’t turn around. “You hate me, fine, join the fucking club, but you need to do this. You need to go home, and you need to do that sooner rather than – than later,” Mickey finished lamely. He knew he wasn’t making any sense, that Gallagher could get there however the fuck he wanted to get there, as long as he got there, but Mickey didn’t want to leave without him. He’d throw himself into the Chicago River before he’d say that to anyone, let alone Gallagher, but he knew it was true by the way his body was slow to move, by the way he was standing there in the cold without a coat, car running and him not inside.
Gallagher turned around, walked up to him, eyes blazing enough that Mickey almost wanted to step back.
“I don’t need you to tell me what the fuck I need to do,” he said. He pushed Mickey on the “fuck” and Mickey stumbled back, surprised, but before he could react Gallagher had popped open the passenger side door and gotten inside. By the time Mickey got in, Gallagher’s body was hugging the door on his side, like he wanted to be as far away from Mickey as physically possible while remaining inside the car. He could still feel the force of Gallagher’s hands on his chest where he’d pushed, and he felt sick.
They drove in silence. After a few minutes had passed, Gallagher rifled in his bag, pulled out a handful of wrinkled one dollar bills, and popped them onto the dash board.
“I don’t need your gas money,” Mickey said, unable to keep the sneer from his face. “This isn’t even my car.”
“Whose car is this?”
“Some dude Mandy’s fucking,” Mickey said. Gallagher didn’t pick up the money.
“And Kenyatta let you take it?” Gallagher snorted. Mickey’s heart began to beat faster. Too much was happening in his head – Gallagher knew who Mandy was fucking, Mandy knew where he was and what he was doing, his family did. Maybe Mickey was the only one who didn’t know anything.
“He didn’t let me do anything,” is all Mickey said. He felt restless. Long minutes passed. He rubbed the inside of his cheek with his tongue.
“See you got a new boyfriend.”
Gallagher didn’t say anything, just kept his eyes trained on something forever outside of the passenger side window, his jaw clenched. Mickey didn’t want to speak – he ran his teeth over his bottom lip with enough force to sting, but he couldn’t stop it. It felt like throwing up.
“That perv from earlier. You fuckin’ him?”
Gallagher turned to look at him. He was a stranger, unrecognizable in this lack of light. He blew smoke in his face in a move that usually resulted in at least one Milkovich catching a case.
“What’s it to you, Mick?” Gallagher said, voice low with an edge to it Mickey could draw blood on. He loosened his shoulders in the closest approximation of a shrug that he could manage.
“Ain’t shit to me,” Mickey said. He rolled down the window and spat. His mouth felt the way it did when he was sick – like his tongue was coated in something toxic. His stomach felt unsettled. He welcomed the burst of cold air to his face. Across from him, Gallagher shifted closer to the door. Mickey rolled the window back up, cranking it quickly so that his arm almost started to burn. The way he moved - Gallagher acted like he was repulsed by him, and in a flash Mickey could remember every single time anyone had ever moved away from him, the other kids at that shitty school where he was the smelly kid because Terry wouldn’t pay the fucking water bill. Shit like that happened sometimes – some fuck would do some random small shit and Mickey would be bludgeoned with the memory of everything he used to be, and he always had to shake it off and say fuck it all. He thought maybe when he got older that shit would fucking stop, but it never really did. He was good at ignoring it though. It only lasted a second anyway – just a flash of memory accompanied by the urge to fuck someone up. Not a big deal.
Mickey reached into the back and pulled his coat from the seat – some fake leather shit from K-Mart that he didn’t really like, only wore to job interviews, but it was warm enough. He threw it onto Gallagher’s lap and brought his hands back to the wheel. It was silent. Mickey thought about turning the radio on but the thought of having to listen to anything in his ear would probably be enough to push him over the edge until he punched or shot something.
Gallagher hadn’t touched the coat in his lap. Let him freeze then. It wouldn’t be his fault.
Mickey ground his teeth and twisted the knob that controlled the heat, shifting in his seat like he was trying to get warm. It had started to rain, and the drops pelted the roof and windows like gravel from an explosion. Mickey concentrated on the motion of the windshield wipers, back and forth, a finger waving no, no, no. Whatever you’re thinking of doing, just fucking don’t.
“You know what? He’s not married so I think he's just my type,” Gallagher said. It didn’t take Mickey long to catch up, and he clenched his fists and breathed a little too hard out of his nostrils.
“Here we fucking go, then,” Mickey said. He took the turn a little too hard and they were both jostled in their seats as the wheels worked over and past the raised curb.
Gallagher had sat up quick, as if he’d been yanked.
“Are you fucking kidding me right now?” Mickey glanced at him; his eyes were narrowed, like he wanted to spit on Mickey. Mickey turned his eyes back to the road.
“It’s not like I did it on purpose just to piss you off,” Mickey said, voice low and face hot, repeating the words that had echoed in his head on his angriest and drunkest of nights, when he’d imagine Gallagher walking into the Alibi, or the dugout, or his room. In these scenarios, they always ended up fucking by the time Mickey was falling asleep or close to passing out, but Mickey wasn’t sure how he’d mentally gotten them there. He wished he knew now.
“You got married. Right in front of me,” Gallagher said, looking at him like he’d grown a second head. ”I asked you not to and you let me fuck you and you fucking did it anyway. You made me watch you kiss some fucking random whore.”
“You didn’t have to watch,” Mickey said. The window was cracked, but it felt like the air had left the car. “Didn’t want you to. Told you to wait for me downstairs. Not my fault you didn’t listen.” Not my fault I married her either, Mickey thought. He didn’t say it though. That way lied shit he didn’t want to talk about, not now and not ever.
Gallagher threw his head back and began to laugh, high-pitched and mean. Mickey thought for a second about jerking the wheel and sending them both into the ditch, fuck it all, maybe punching Gallagher and letting him punch him back. The thought was fucked up but it loosened his shoulders and back like hot stones on skin.
“I say something funny?” Mickey said, schooling his voice into something firm that wasn’t yelling.
“No funnier than usual.” When Mickey looked over at him, Gallagher’s smile was almost genuine, the way a dog can look normal while it’s jaw is clenched around something dying, unmoving, no blood yet fallen because it hasn’t yet removed its teeth. Gallagher shook his head and turned back to the window. Mickey turned back to the road, bile steadily rising in his throat like water in a sinking ship. “God, I almost forgot how full of shit you are. I can’t believe I’m even sitting in this fucking car right now, with you of all people, having this conversation.”
“What the fuck does that mean?” Mickey said, forcing himself to speak slowly.
“What do you think it means, Mickey?” Gallagher said, voice gone soft, bored almost, as he stared out the window. At the sound of that voice, Mickey realized he wanted the yelling back, but Gallagher’s anger seemed to have come and gone in a flash quicker and more deadly than lightening, leaving nothing but smoke behind. It was like he’d shut down, like when your hand slips on a radio’s volume dial and the noise deafens you for a moment before you turn it down to almost nothing. It freaked Mickey the fuck out.
“I can’t read your fucking mind,” he said finally. He turned on the radio – a hip hop beat hit him in the chest. He let it pound. He could see Gallagher still turned toward the window, like he didn’t have a care in the world. He propped his foot up on the dash with a kick. Mickey glanced at his boots, back to the road, back to the boots, the kind of black lace-up shit that looked new, and he thought of Gallagher shopping in downtown Chicago and riding in the passenger seat of some ugly old pervert’s expensive car and snorting coke or some shit in the back of some nasty ass fag club. He thought of it and held it up next to everything he had done and felt and pretended not to feel that week. He wanted to hit something and he didn’t know exactly why, though his mind flirted with ideas he didn’t like, and that pissed him off even more.
“There gonna be glitter and jizz on the dash when you move your foot?“
“Fuck you,” Gallagher said, talking over Mickey, dropping his foot and raising up to better look like he was going to reach over and choke Mickey. The thought didn’t scare him, and he realized with a twist of revulsion at himself that it excited him. Gallagher threw himself back against the seat, attention back to the window. “You know what? How about you just not talk to me?”
“Works for me,” Mickey said. He knew what he’d said earlier was fucked up but there was no part of him interested in apologizing. He was angry and confused and tired, but more than that he felt stupid that he’d ever let himself think that the moment they saw each other again would be anything other than this.
It was silent for a moment. He was watching Gallagher out of the corner of his eye, harder than he’d like, when he turned to Mickey. Mickey stared back at the road, and Gallagher spoke again.
“You’re the last person I ever wanted to see tonight.”
They hit a red light, and Mickey broke too hard. He didn’t look at Gallagher. He grabbed his cigarettes from the cup holder, tried to light one up while he had time. The light turned green when the lighter was still at his mouth, the flame refusing to catch. Behind him a horn honked, obnoxious in its insistence. He threw a middle finger out of the window, then thought better of it and stuck his head out to join it, eyed the shit-brown pickup in the mirror behind him, and shouted “Aye, fuck you!”
The guy jumped out of the truck and started yelling – some fat fuck with a confederate flag belt buckle and a combover with a ponytail that he probably thought was fooling someone. Mickey was out of the car before the asshole even reached him. The cold rain felt good as soon as it hit him. For an instant, he wanted to rip off his shirt and fucking rip this dude’s throat out. He felt like a wild animal when that air hit him. Maybe there was something in it, something in the rain, something in tonight.
“We got a fucking problem?” the man said, and Mickey grabbed his shoulders and headbutted him. The guy went down quick and heavy, and Mickey was on him, taking advantage of his disorientation to grip his skull and punch down, harsh and unforgiving, like punching a pillow. The guy was stronger than he looked and got Mickey’s forearms out from him long enough to rear up and get in a few brutal blows right to Mickey’s face, but one thing Terry said about him that was true is that he fights like a goddamn mental patient. Fat Fuck grabbed his face and Mickey bit his hand, then hauled back and punched him in the gut. Around them, cars were honking and speeding away. Let someone try to get in this. Mickey had enough of whatever was in his system to go around.
He felt a hand on his shoulder, whirled around to bring whoever it was down, but it was Gallagher who grabbed him now and shoved him in the direction of the car. Mickey let himself be pushed onto the passenger seat, heard the sirens coming closer like the fucking east wind. He used the back of his hand to wipe the blood from his mouth. He sniffed, holding back snot or blood and popped open the glove box where Kenyatta kept his shit. He pulled out the small bottle of Jim Bean, the size of hotel shampoo, and thought Fuck you, Kenyatta. He was twisting off the cap when Gallagher grabbed it from his hand. He downed it and tossed the bottle out of the window, barely taking his eyes off the road.
“Real nice,” Mickey said.
“Call it an asshole tax,” Gallagher said. He turned to Mickey, and for the first time maybe, Mickey saw his face, and maybe it was the loss of adrenaline from the fight but he couldn’t pretend anymore, not with him so close, and everything that asshole brought out in him wanted to slide out like sand from a fist, and he wished he had the bottle back because his face and eyes were hot in a way that made him nervous. He turned away, sniffing up snot, maybe blood, wiped rain from his forehead, face, eyes. He lifted the bottom of his shirt and wiped his face all over, trying to pretend that he wasn’t just holding the fabric to his face because he needed to try to focus on breathing and nothing else. Suddenly he just wanted to go home and be away from everything else – but home wasn’t away from anything. Maybe he just wanted to be nowhere.
He’d hoped Gallagher hadn’t noticed, but when he put his shirt down, now damp with blood and rainwater, his eyes were on him.
“The fuck you lookin’ at?” Mickey muttered, hating how pathetic he sounded, like a stupid fucking child. He wanted to get out and walk home. He ran a hand through his hair. This was starting to feel like the worst night he had had in a very long time. The last one he could remember – well, he didn’t want to think about that one either.
“You cut your hair?”
“What?” Mickey was startled enough to look at him, and Gallagher glanced over at him, tongue running beneath his bottom lip, poking his skin out in weird ways.
“You look different.”
Mickey thought of what to say, came up with nothing, and answered truthfully: “I don’t know. Maybe.” He didn’t really keep track of shit like that.
Gallagher turned to him, really quickly, then back to the road.
“I don’t-“ he started, and they both jumped at the sudden vibration of the seats. Gallagher dug his phone out of his back pocket – a different phone, Mickey noticed, what happened to his old one, where’d he get the money for the shit in his hand, who the fuck bought him that and what did he have to give in return? Gallagher answered and listened in silence for a long time. “I told you I’ll be there,” he said, and hung up.
Gallagher’s face changed, Mickey saw his jaw tighten and the set of his shoulders shift, and suddenly he saw it clear as day: he was scared. He was fucking scared.
Hs mother had been right. Nothing like a good fight to clear your head and your eyes.
“You’re gonna miss the turn,” Mickey said, gesturing out the window. Gallagher turned.
Blood pooled in Mickey’s mouth. He wrenched the window down, spit, and wrenched it back up. He took a deep breath, but didn’t let himself think too much before he spoke.
“Your brother said he’s gonna be fine,” Mickey said.
“You talked to Lip?” Gallagher glanced at him.
“He told Mandy. Mandy told me,” Mickey said. It was not a lie, not a large one.
Minutes passed slowly, time stretching out between them like pulled molasses. Mickey rifled through the glove box, idly going through Kenyatta’s things – condoms, cigarillos, crappy CD s. He pushed it shut again and leaned back against his seat, rubbing his forehead. He looked at Gallagher through lowered eyes, but he was focused on the road – a little too intently, if you asked him.
“There a reason you don’t wanna see ‘em?” Mickey asked.
“Who says I don’t want to see them?” Gallagher said, voice low. It made Mickey think of a four-legged beast, circling.
“You walk like you got fuckin anvils in your boots.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Gallagher said, still not looking at him.
“Fine.” Mickey rolled down his window, stuck his elbow out and let the cold air in.
They rode in silence the rest of the way, no sound but the insistent tap tap tap of Gallagher’s fingers on the steering wheel, the slide of the leather squeaking with every idle jostle of Ian’s thigh against the seat. Outside, the rain had passed and a low fog settled over everything in sight.
Gallagher pulled the car into an empty spot across the street from his house. He reached across Mickey’s lap and pulled his bag off of the ground. Mickey swallowed against the weight of Gallagher on his body, what it did to him, even just for that second that it was there. His bag looked heavy, and Mickey wondered what he kept inside, where he’d been, who he was now and how he had become that person, someone Mickey maybe didn’t know anymore but still – still wanted, in ways that made him feel like he was losing his mind.
Gallagher flipped up his hood and zipped up the hoodie to his neck but didn’t move. Mickey wondered if he was afraid enough of seeing his family that he was going to force himself to make conversation with someone he hated.
The crumpled ones from earlier had migrated onto the floor next to Mickey’s feet. He picked them up and held them out – Gallagher pocketed it quickly. Then he made to move, hand reaching for the door handle, and Mickey panicked. His hand reached out and wrapped itself around Gallagher’s wrist, a violent spasm. This wasn’t right. Gallagher had chilled out from the time he’d seen him in the club, but he was sitting there clutching his bag, and he wasn’t himself, didn’t even look himself, and Mickey wanted to shake him until whatever was in him, fucking him up like this, came out. His heart had begun to thunder in his chest, and he knew that it was because he didn’t want Gallagher to leave like this, with nothing feeling right or fixed the way he’d allowed himself to hope it would, when it was dark and quiet and no one else was around. He knew that he’d gotten pathetic in recent weeks, but the thing about desperation is that it has a way of crowding out shame.
When he spoke, his voice only shook a fraction, enough that he could tell himself later that it hadn’t at all, that he had been stronger than he really was.
“Look, if you ever need something, like a ride, or whatever-.” he started. Gallagher’s eyes were trained on Mickey’s hand on his wrist, but he looked up at Mickey, and Mickey was overcome with the knowledge that he couldn’t do it, because all he wanted was to pull him closer and reach every part of him with his tongue with his hands with his body with his cock, but he didn’t know if he wanted that too, anymore, not this new kid who had night smeared across his eyes and tiny black feathers still sticking to the back of his hair, like some mythical creature post-transformation, and the thought was just too damn much. He pulled his hand away, smoothed it over the top of his jeans, scratched his eyebrow with his thumb. He didn’t look at Gallagher, for fear of what he would say, of what he was already saying and had already said. Mickey’s face and eyes felt hot in a way that made him nervous. “You know where I live,” he finished. He got out of the car without a backwards glance. He could taste the blood still lingering in his mouth, the bitter tang of copper deep in his cheeks. He rounded the car, but Gallagher was standing at the driver’s side door waiting for him. His face told him nothing, and Mickey didn’t know what kind of blow to brace himself for.
“Ian!” Mickey’s head shot around. The little red-haired chick who was always hanging around Mandy was rushing down the front steps of the Gallagher home. Wouldn’t be long before the rest of them caught on and poured out. Mickey wasn’t eager to eavesdrop on the family reunion. He pushed past Gallagher, who looked like he was caught between speaking and leaving. Mickey would make it easy – he was doing the guy a favor, and if he saved himself from something painful or awkward, then all the better. He wasn’t there for that conversation anyway – he was there to get him home, where he needed to be, where his stupid normal family needed him to be, and he was now, so what reason did Mickey have to be standing around outside with his thumb up his ass? He got into the car and drove off, looking into his rearview to see the two of them crossing the street, the girl pulling her brother along, hugging his arm. Mission accomplished, right? That was the whole point. He did what he was supposed to do. Mickey fucking Milkovich had saved the day. Who the fuck would ever think it?
He bypassed his block and instead stopped at the liquor store two streets over. He made it quick – the light inside seemed too harsh, and inside it seemed harder not to think about the way Gallagher had looked like a stranger being dragged into a strange home when Mickey had pulled off, like the girl had found someone on the street and was taking him inside where it was warm. He paid for his shit, wrapped his hand around the small brown paper bag that had the whiskey nestled inside, and left. Once he got home, a part of him hoped Kenyatta would see him sitting outside in his car and come start some shit about taking it in the first place. He was a big son of a bitch, and Mickey was drunk and had already had one fight today, so he’d probably get his ass kicked, but he didn’t care.
It was Mandy, though, who found him. She knocked on the glass, and Mickey popped the lock with fingers that were starting to feel lazy with the heat of alcohol in his system.
“You see him?” Mandy said, barely in the car. Mickey nodded.
“He home now?” Mandy asked. Mickey nodded.
“He do that?” she gestured at his face, which must have still been fucked up from earlier. He shook his head.
“You ok?” Mandy asked. Mickey took another swig from the bottle. He brought it down from his lips and Mandy snatched it away, took a long pull off the bottle that would have had lesser men choking and sputtering like babies. Not a lotta girls he knew could down whiskey like his sister could, but Mandy was a Milkovich, and that explained a lot of things about the both of them.
“What’s wrong with him?” he blurted later, after Mandy ha gotten sick of sitting in silence and had popped in one of Kenyatta’s Kanye albums. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Mandy’s eyes soften. It didn’t bother him as much as it should have – maybe because he was well and truly drunk, or because it was Mandy, or because the time on the dash blinked an electric green 3 am and he just didn’t have it in him to give a shit about anything anymore.
“What do you think, dickhead?”
Mickey shook his head. “It’s more than that,” he said. Mandy was silent.
“Yeah,” she said. They sat and drank until most of the bottle was gone, until the last thing he remembered was the smell of his sister’s neck as she hauled him up the steps and onto the couch. He’d turned his face into the cushion and welcomed the dark pull into unconsciousness when it came.